Andy Devine Movies

We Americans was based on the Broadway play of the same name. Returning to the "melting pot" themes that he handled so well, director Edward H. Sloman concentrates on the trials and tribulations of three first-generation American families: The Jewish Levines, the German Schmidts and the Italian Albertinis. Most of the footage is devoted to the efforts of pants-presser Mr. Levine (George Sidney) to carve out a decent existence for his family in the teeming garment district of New York. While Levine's daughter Beth (Patsy Ruth Miller) dedicates herself to hard work, his son Phil (George Lewis) prefers to fritter away his time at sports events. Angry that Beth spends too much time at her job and not enough with her housekeeping duties, Levine orders her out of the house -- and when Phil, angry at the treatment afforded his sister, marches off to WWI, Levine and his wife (Beryl Mercer) are left all alone. Their neighbors, the Schmidts and the Albertinis, try to convince the stubborn Levines that they've mishandled their children, but to do this it is necessary to educate the Jewish couple in American manners and mores. Thus, the Levines are encouraged to join their neighbors in attending night school, where they are finally convinced that the ways of the Old World are not necessarily the best. Soon afterward, Phil Levine is killed in the trenches of France while saving the life of the socially prominent Hugh Bradleigh (John Boles). Upon his return to New York, Hugh seeks out Phil's family and promptly falls in love with Beth, now a successful dressmaker. Hugh's parents are initially resistant to their son's romance, until they discover that their boy would not be alive today were it not for Phil Levine's sacrifice. In the film's sentimental finale, the Levines and the Bradleighs meet one another for the first time to exchange pleasantries before the wedding of Hugh and Beth. Edward Sloman had originally wanted Yiddish stage actor Muni Weisenfreund, a specialist in elderly characterizations, to play the role of Levine, but upon discovering that Weisenfruend was only 30 years old, the director opted for middle-aged George Sidney instead. The "rejected" Weisenfreund later attained film stardom under the name of Paul Muni. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Red Lips was based on the novel The Plastic Age by Percy Marks, previously filmed under its original title in 1925. Charles "Buddy" Rogers stars as college track star Hugh Carver, who'd rather party than anything else. Hugh's bad habits eventually catch up with him, leading to his expulsion when co-ed Cynthia Day (Marion Nixon) is found in his dorm room (it's all quite innocent, but try telling that to the Dean). Fortunately, Cynthia is able to get Hugh to stop feeling sorry for himself; our hero gets his act back together in record time, is reinstated on the football team, and emerges the winner in the Big Game. The film was also released as Cream of the Earth. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Naughty Baby in this late-silent opus is hat-check girl Rosie McGill, played by bubbly blonde Alice White. Taking a special interest in tippling millionaire Terry Vanderveer (Jack Mulhall), Rosie tries to save him from the grasp of fortune-hunting Bonnie LeVonne (Thelma Todd). Could it be that Rosie is actually in love with Terry herself? It could indeed. Prominent in the supporting cast are George E. Stone as bush-league gangster Toni Caponi, Jewish comedian Benny Rubin as Benny Cohen, and Andy Devine as Joe Cassidy: while Alice White's star would fade in the 1930s, Stone, Rubin and Devine would still be working well into the 1960s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This drama is set at Notre Dame and follows the exploits of a great football coach (patterned after Knute Rockne) who is conflicting with a promising but arrogant freshman running back. The story centers on the coach's struggle to help Bucky O'Brien understand that his glory hog ways will not help the team. Bucky ends up getting demoted to blocking for his more talented teammate, Jim Stewart. Bucky is frustrated by his new role and refuses to play. He is promptly benched during the big Notre Dame vs. Army bout. In the end, the Army is beating the pants off the Fighting Irish, and at the last moment Bucky is put into the game. This time he plays for the team and they win. A sub-plot involves the caring coach's efforts to help an ailing player who is hospitalized. The film was dedicated to Rockne, who died a few months before its release, and features several real players from Notre Dame, including the Four Horsemen--Don Miller, Elmer Layden, Jim Crowley, and Harry Stuhldreher. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The concept of radio patrol cars was still brand-spanking new when this fast-moving programmer came off the Universal assembly line. Robert Armstrong and Russell Hopton star as Bill Kennedy and Pat Bourke, a pair of radio cops assigned to protect the payroll of a meat-packing company. Their job is complicated by a crooked officer who is "on the take." After undergoing a grueling training program, our heroes get a chance to prove their worthiness in a climactic set-to with the villains. When the smoke clears at fade-out time, four of the five main characters have been killed, which may have been something of a record back in 1932. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Ruth Robbins (Mae Clarke) is already a cynic about marriage, and well she should be -- at age 19, she's the secretary/stenographer to Albert Hartman (John Halliday), one of the top divorce lawyers in Los Angeles, and she's heard so many detailed accounts of marriages gone wrong that she regards the institution itself as poison. She's living happily enough with her daffy southern roommate Betty Merrick (Una Merkel) in a run-down apartment in Los Angeles's Bunker Hill section, off of Angel's Flight, going about her life. And then she chances to meet Myron Brown (Lew Ayres), a young doctor just starting his internship. They fall in love and he wants to marry her, but knows that it will be years before he can earn any real money; she's practical as well, and allegic to marriage, so they do nothing about their feelings, which leaves them both miserable. In the course of trying to forget him, she takes her employer up on his seemingly altruistic offer of an apartment in the building he owns -- but Brown gets the wrong idea about Ruth, Hartman, and the apartment, and abandons any thought of marrying her. Meanwhile, Betty has fallen in love with Clarence Howe (Andy Devine), a talkative and eccentric male nurse who rides in the same ambulance that Myron is assigned to -- and Clarence also gets the wrong idea and insists that Betty leave her friend. It also turns out that Hartman's intentions weren't all honorable, after all, and Ruth is left without a job or a decent home to live in. Matters go from bad to worse when she's hit with a sudden attack of acute appendicitis, which brings Myron back into her life, just as her life is on the line. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, a shady jockey, Marty Black, teams up with Silk Henley to con the punters at little racetracks. Marty goes straight after he meets the feisty orphan, Midge. He then falls in love with Sally who runs a boarding house. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A star football player in college, Garry King (Richard Arlen) finds post-college life very different; he betrays the trust of his best friend Steve (Preston S. Foster), finally losing his job. Meanwhile, his younger brother Bob (John Darrow), also a football star, is on the same track to ruin; when Garry reforms himself, events give him the opportunity to help Bob as well. Many football players and coaches of the time appear as themselves. ~ Bill Warren, All Movie Guide

An early screen version of the oft-filmed tale of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Law and Order was adapted by young screenwriter John Huston from W. R. Burnett's novel, which alters the names of the principals but few of the facts. The film opens with a montage of the settling of the West, concluding with the observation that lawless behavior soon followed in many settlements. Walter Huston plays Frame Johnson, a steely-eyed gambler whose three companions, Brant, Luther (Frame's brother), and Deadwood, form a team of sorts, wandering from town to town in search of a good poker game. Johnson's reputation as "the man that cleaned up Kansas, the killingest peace officer that ever lived" precedes him when he arrives in Tombstone, a town controlled by the Northrup brothers and their crooked sheriff, Fin Elder. A committee of lawful citizens, led by a judge, try to hire Johnson to clean up the town, but he's reluctant to pin on the badge again. Inevitably, he does, and there's a showdown that leaves a corral full of corpses. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide

Will Rogers is Dr. Bull, a small-town physician with precious little book learning. This doesn't stop him from ministering to the citizens, often substituting advice and witticisms for pills and sutures. There are those who resist Dr. Bull's everyday doses of common sense and humanity, especially the gossip mongers who read the worst into the doctor's frequent visits to a lonely widow (Vera Lewis). Bull triumphs over his adversaries when he stems a typhoid epidemic, proving that the disease was spread by pollution from the construction camp owned by the town's resident Scrooge (Berton Churchill). Directed by John Ford with his usual compassion towards sensible small-town types, Dr. Bull was adapted from The Last Adam, a novel by James Gould Cozzens. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A spoiled rich girl marries a gas station owner in this dated romance starring Joel McCrea, Ginger Rogers, and Marion Nixon. It is love at first sight when debutante Glory Franklyn (Nixon) spots handsome grease monkey Blacky Gorman (McCrea), who promptly dumps faithful girlfriend Marje Harris (Rogers) to marry the heiress. Wedded bliss, however, quickly gives way to everyday worries and Glory even fails at cooking a dinner. Because she still loves Blacky, Marje nobly gives her rival a crash course in good housekeeping, but the spoiled Glory discovers that she is expecting and high tails it back to Mama (Virginia Hammond), who never approved of the marriage and is only too happy to see it fail. Fearing that his wife will obtain an abortion, Blacky hurries to New York, but is too late. Divorced and heartbroken, the young gas station owner finds solace in the arms of the loyal Marje. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Loaned to MGM by her home studio of Warner Bros., Loretta Young suffers her way through the title role in Midnight Mary. A good girl led astray, Mary (Young) endeavors to save the life of her boyfriend Tom (Franchot Tone) by killing the aptly named Leo the Rat (Ricardo Cortez). As her case is heard in court, the clerk goes over Mary's record, and at this point the flashbacks begin, stretching all the way back to her days as an unwanted orphan. One bad break leads to another, and by the time she reaches adulthood Mary is mixed up with a gang of crooked gamblers. For the sake of Tom, a well-connected socialite who loves her unquestioningly, Mary tries to go straight, but her past, and the ill-fated Leo the Rat, catch up with her. No matter what disaster befalls her in Midnight Mary, Loretta Young always manages to look as though she's just stepped out of a beauty salon. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, two rubes from Montana find a fortune after they discover radium on their ranch. The nouveau riche ranchers then take a trip to England to see one of their girlfriends whose father sent her to stay with her blue-blooded relatives to keep her away from the red-necked country boy. As soon as the boys get to London, they really start paintin' the town red and getting into all sorts of trouble until they manage to reveal the true identity of a phony nobleman, a fugitive from justice. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide